Double Oscar-winner Cate Blanchett films at the Friedrichstadt-Palast Berlin

Along with Nicole Kidman, Cate Blanchett is one of Australia’s top female Hollywood exports. She achieved her breakthrough with her Academy Award nominated leading role in ‘Elizabeth’. Numerous successes followed, including David Fincher’s ‘The Curious Case of Benjamin Button’, Peter Jackson’s epic ‘The Lord of the Rings’, and Steven Soderbergh’s ‘The Good German’.

Cate Blanchett, the Drag Queen and aliens from THE WYLD in Berlin got along famously | Photo: Barbara Schmidt (Photo: Business Wire)

The exceptional actress has won more than 70 film and festival awards, been nominated for an Oscar six times, and received the coveted gong in 2005 for best supporting actress in Martin Scorsese’s ‘The Aviator’ and in 2014 for best leading actress in Woody Allen’s ‘Blue Jasmine’.

In Berlin this December, Cate Blanchett has been filming under strictest secrecy with director and artist Julian Rosefeldt, whose works are on display in renowned collections such as the Museum of Modern Art in New York. Rosefeldt’s work consists primarily of elaborate film installations. In her screen role as a strict choreographer, where – with makeup artistry – she appears much older, Cate Blanchett filmed scenes from new hit production THE WYLD with the Berlin Palast’s ballet company.

Cate Blanchett was highly impressed with the new production: “It was a unique experience to shoot at the Palast, to work with its ballett ensemble and the extraordinary characters of the WYLD show. The experience will long live in my memory.”

Until 2013, together with her husband Andrew Upton, Cate Blanchett was responsible for the artistic direction of the Sydney Theatre Company, Australia. Apart from her illustrious movie career, she is also a passionate stage actress and aficionado of the international theatre scene.

Word about the new quality of Grand Shows at the Palast has spread internationally, and the artist and director expressly wanted to shoot film scenes with the ballet ensemble on the largest stage in the world. With 60 dancers, the Palast Ballet is the world’s largest standing show-ballet company.

The new Grand Show THE WYLD has got off to a record start. In less than a quarter of a year (the first performance was on 7 October), a quarter of a million tickets have now been sold or reserved. This is a new sales record for the theatre at Friedrichstrasse 107.

‘Looking back on 2014, we can do some top-notch name-dropping: Tom Hanks rehearsed at the Palast; we created our new Grand Show with Parisian fashion genius Thierry Mugler; Amanda Lear and Jean Paul Gaultier recently came to see THE WYLD; and now Cate Blanchett has filmed with our aliens and drag queens. We feel truly honoured,’ reports theatre director Dr. Berndt Schmidt.

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